The Wall Street Journal – Tale of Two Loan Programs More than half of $4 billion in federal funds disbursed this year to spur small-business lending by community banks was used to repay bailout funds that the banks received under the government’s Troubled Asset Relief Program. The Small Business Lending Fund was meant to raise… Continue reading Government Bureaucracy At Its Finest
The Wall Street Journal – BofA Blames Website Slowness on Upgrade A botched technology upgrade was responsible for online banking problems that spilled into a sixth day at Bank of America Corp., inconveniencing customers and handing the biggest U.S. bank by assets fresh image problems. In an interview with The Wall Street Journal late Wednesday,… Continue reading Bank of America’s Website
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Charts of the Week Topics Covered This Week Include: Is A Recession Coming? On The Verge Of A Bear Market Will Operation Twist Matter? A Look At Credit Muni Yields A Look At Corporate Profits Gold’s Bull Run Walkaways And Foreclosures It Was 30 Years Today … Mutual Funds Flows Mutual Funds Flows Italy Is… Continue reading Charts of the Week
The Financial Times – EU ministers look at bank aid plans European Union finance ministers are examining ways of co-ordinating recapitalisations of financial institutions after they agreed that additional measures were urgently needed to shore up the region’s banks. Although the details of the plan are still under discussion, officials said EU ministers meeting in… Continue reading The EU Looks To ‘Save’ The Banks
Bloomberg.com – Dexia, BNP Resist Greek Losses Three Times Worse Than Booked While most banks have marked their Hellenic debt to market prices, a decline of as much as 51 percent, France’s two biggest lenders and Belgium’s largest cut the value of some holdings by 21 percent. The practice, which doesn’t violate accounting rules, may… Continue reading More On Dexia
The New York Times – In Europe, Signs of 2nd Recession With Wide Reach The European debt problems that have roiled global financial markets for the last 18 months are showing signs of turning into a far deeper challenge: Europe’s second recession in three years. Greece, Ireland, Portugal and Spain are already in downturns or… Continue reading Recession Fears In Europe
The Financial Times – Martin Wolf: How to keep the euro on the road The easy credit conditions and low interest rates of the first decade delivered property bubbles and explosions of private borrowing in Ireland and Spain, incontinent public borrowing in Greece, declines in external competitiveness in Greece, Italy and Spain and huge external… Continue reading Discussing The Eurozone
<Click on chart for larger image> Bloomberg.com – Italy’s Credit Rating Cut by Moody’s on Weak Growth Outlook Italy’s credit rating was cut by Moody’s Investors Service for the first time in almost two decades on concern that Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi’s government will struggle to reduce the region’s second-largest debt amid chronically weak growth.… Continue reading Italy Is Downgraded
The Financial Times – John Dizard: Why a reworked Greek deal will happen Intra-Europe capital flight that has taken place over the past couple of months has made the prospective Greek workout (debt rescheduling) plan so ludicrously profitable for speculators and outrageously expensive for euro-area taxpayers, that I believe a justified fear of public anger… Continue reading Greece
<Click on chart for largest image> The Wall Street Journal – Stocks Claw Back Against the Bear Stock investors beat back the bear on Tuesday. Having spent much of the day in bear-market territory, the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index staged a late-day surge that saw the measure swing from a decline of 1.8% to… Continue reading Saved From A Bear Market … For Now
The Wall Street Journal – Bernanke Issues Warning, Urges Action on Economy Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke warned the U.S. economic recovery was “close to faltering,” and said Congress and the White House had a “shared responsibility” with the central bank to respond. Such dire warnings are a gamble for Fed chiefs—or any leading policy… Continue reading Bernanke Speaks